Humanities and Social Sciences in the World: Threats against Academic Freedom

Research and education in humanities and social sciences are currently restrained and threatened by political forces outside the university.

This conference will bring together perspectives from different places in the world to discuss this urgent situation:

What is our role as researchers, teachers, leaders and administrators when disciplines like gender studies are closed down or when academics lose their jobs or are imprisoned because of their research?
Where does the boundary go between legitimate scientific criticism on the one hand and a threat to academic freedom on the other, involving the right to choose subjects, research methods and modes of publication?
In an increasingly polarized political landscape where core values of democracy are questioned, what challenges do universities face with regards to their work and international collaborations?

Presentations from the conference

Andrea Petö, Professor of Gender Studies at Central European University, Hungary

Leila Papoli-Yazdi, Archaeologist and Scholars at Risk Researcher at the University of Gothenburg; Sweden

Arun Kumar; Assistant Professor of Modern British Imperial, Colonial, and Post-Colonial History, University of Nottingham; UK

Sofie Tornhill; Political Scientist and Senior Lecturer of Gender Studies at Linnaeus University; Sweden

Orla Duke, InSPirEurope

Amrita Ghosh; Visiting Lecturer in postcolonial Studies, Linnaeus University and visiting researcher at SASNET, Lund University; Sweden (moderator)

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If you do not already have the Zoom client installed on your computer, you will need to make the following steps to install and configure Zoom:

Download the Zoom.us software on the device which you will use for the video conference (Windows, macOS, Android or iOS)
Test the internet connection and the audio system (microphone + headphones/ speakers) and video (webcam). You can click here to test a Zoom conference meeting.

Accessing the video conferencing link, in the form of https://zoom.us/j/xxxxxxxxxx, which you will find for each session. This will open the already installed application.
The authentication in the video conference is done with the email and password previously received from the conference administration.

Write your name and institution - eg. John Doe - University of Everywhere. In order to see how to do this please read this.
Keep the microphone turned off when you are not speaking, since background noise can be very distracting.
In order to talk with the moderators and other speakers try using the chat. Find instructions here.
In order to share your screen watch this short tutorial.
During a zoom conference you can give more non-verbal feedback - by raising your hand to ask for permission to speak, or by answering yes / no, etc. To see where you can access them, look at the explanatory images here.

Set your video resolution to 1920x1080. If you use a mobile phone to record, record in landscape (horizontal) format.
Use a neutral background and record in good light.
Place yourself slightly to the left or right of the centre of the frame, and make sure not to have too much air above your head.
Place your camera at the same level as your head.
Preferably, use a wired lavalier microphone plugged into your computer or phone. In case you do not have access to a lavalier, use a high-quality USB microphone or a high-quality phone headset. Try to avoid large headsets, as these do not look good on video.
Avoid using a room witch echo or other disturbing sounds.
Preferably, do not use a virtual background. In case you record in Zoom with a lit green screen behind you, it is ok to use a virtual background.
Choose mp4 as your file format

Organized by the Faculty of Arts and Humanities and the Centre for Gender Studies at Linnaeus University